Donate blood, save lives

Last week we prepared a media campaing to promote the blood donation, we made a facebook page, logo and poster.

Also we prepared a questionary to have statistics about how is the blood donation in Romania.

If you want you can make too:

https://esurv.org/online-survey.php?surveyID=LBDKHH_c375c179

After that, we wanted to contribute, so we went to the donation center of Râmnicu Vâlcea with some volunteers of our organization.

We wake up very early and went with enthusiasm for a really good cause.

When we arrived the first things they asked were "Where are you from? Do you have resident permise?" We though it was a normal process, but then it was a burocratic issue.

They cheched the legislation and they told us that we can't donate if we aren't here for one year or we aren't from the European Union; well we are for almost one year, but not one year exactly.

That was a very bad news because we really wanted to donate and we know that it's a important cause which save lives.

Even if we couldn't, we continued with the campaing, and we realized some interviews to Romanian people who donated that day and made a video about the experience.

Also, during that day, we went to a local television to talk about the campaing and the importance of blood donation.

COMPLEXUL MUZEAL MALDAREŞTİ

In the 24th of August we made a visit to a village museum called Complexul Muzeal Maldareşti.It is located in the village of Maldareşti, 4 km out of the city Horezu in the state of Valcea.

In this museum we visited 'Cula Greceanu' which is the oldest tower in Romania.
According to information passed by word of mouth, the kula was already built at the beginning of the 17^th century and it belonged to Captain Tudor Maldăr. Tudor Maldăr's son, the great wine-bearer Atanasie, modified the kula in 1688. The kula that we see now was redeveloped in the 18^th century, as it was rebuilt over 1780-1790 by boyar Gheorghe Măldărescu and his wife, Eva, who also commissioned the “Saint Nicholas and Saint Voivods” church in 1790, in the close vicinity of thekula. In the 19^th century, the kula was given, as dowry, to Greceanu family. It was restored in 1934 by its last owners: Nicolae şi Olga Greceanu. Then it was nationalised, repaired once again in 1966-1967 and turned into a museum.
The kula has three floors. There is a separate access to the cellar, from the outside. The cellar is divided into three rooms. One of these rooms, placed under the turret, is built of stones and has embrasures, unlike the other two rooms, which are built of brick and ventilated through stone-lintelled windows. These elements are previous to the interventions at the end of the 18^th century. The living quarters of the kula's are accessed through a heavily reinforced door. The inner staircase leads to a loggia situated on the kula's second floor. This leads to a room situated in the tower, above the old cellar, which has doors and windows reinforced with wooden bars, and a hiding place in the ceiling, closed with a trapdoor and accessible via a mobile ladder. The hiding place is only ventilated through the embrasures. Other living quarters are situated on this level as well. This is the place where, in 1936, Olga Greceanu, painted the “sponsors” on the wall, drawing her inspiration from the portraits painted at the entrance of the Măldăreşti church, which is located in the close vicinity of the kula. Both the mural room and the hidden one are covered with perforated vaults. The second floor also hosts the living quarters and a turret.

The other imposing fortified house that we visited is the Maldarescu Fortified Mansion, built by Gheorghita Maldarescu in 1812. The rectangular building consists of one ground floor and two floors.I.G. Duca, who was the prime minister of Romania for a short period in 1933, became the owner of the fortified mansion in 1910. Two years later, in 1912, he tried to arrange the interior of Maldarescu Fortified Mansion, in an original way, with traditional and folk items.As most of these items are not there anymore, a permanent exhibition organized in the mansion tries to keep the trend from the beginning of the century.

The Maldaresti Museum Complex also hosts the I.G. Duca Memorial House, built in 1910-1912 as a holiday house. Duca was Prime Minister of Romania from November 14 to December 30, 1933, when he was assassinated in Sinaia train station.

In this visit we were hosted and guided very well by Mihaela who explained a lot about the history about the houses and the place.

We were very happy to discover this place and also to share this experience with our mentor Traian and our coordinator Georgeta.